/jp/ - Otaku Culture

>>20447301
Otaku no Video was a strange piece of media, two full-length episdoes, half-anime, half-documentary, both explaining and parodying otaku culture, which was at the time almost sinful. It scrutinized otaku for the extent of their hobbies, but also showed that these hobbies are also a part of otherwise normative office workers. I'm astonished by how openly some of them would speak of their hobbies, like it was a taboo breach of privacy. I don't think any non-otaku who watched it would think much better of otaku afterwards, but at the very least, it provided a glimpse into their world.

Densha Otoko swept Japan over. It was immensely popular with prime time viewing rates skyrocketing. I don't blame the production for being a little creative, because the original material was basically a collection of dubious threads, which cannot completely be trusted to come from the same person. It brought internet culture to the mainstream, and gave heartfelt representations of various forms of otaku activities, not only anime and manga but baseball, trains and shoes. The original forum threads were perhaps the first internet event to stir the physical Japan to that extent, and I am grateful for the adaptation, to have remained culturally relevant to this day.
I actually heard a funny story from a Japanese person around two years back, about how Densha Otoko caused Electric Light Orchestra's "Twilight" and the theme album it originated from, "Time", to be registered in the Japanese mindset as "otaku music". Even today, some, upon seeing the name Electric Light Orchestra, think back to those times, as this same song was used for Densha Otoko's opening sequence. Though this is only half-truth, because the production of Densha Otoko based the opening sequence on DAICON IV's opening animation, which used(plagiarized) the same song more than 20 years earlier - made by the same people to produce Otaku no Video in the middle point between these two occurrences.

I know that Haruhi's success within Japan was phenomenal. In memory, it is also caused the largest cultural explosion in Western anime scenes. I wonder if it also caused anime streaming(the most accessible method of watching anime at the time) to become more common. I remember watching Haruhi in 2006-2007, but I wasn't yet exposed to it influence on anime communities around me. It's a good question how other Western otaku traditions developed over the two, three years following Haruhi. Take for example Azumanga Daioh's popularity in the west before and after Haruhi. Anime like Lucky Star, which were a hit in Japan, translated immediately to a massive fan following among Western anime fans. It's like Haruhi was the uplink to global anime culturalism.

I linked an image of catalogs I recently purchased for research on changes within doujin culture in the late 90's. As can be seen, the Comiket committee update the covers of the catalogs to reflect a scrolling change in Japanese otaku culture. What's peculiar is that Shiori Fujisaki, the lead bishoujo of Tokimeki Memorial, makes an appearance on the cover of Comic Market 61 of 2001! The echoes of Tokimeki Memorial were still felt several years later, and indeed, there were also doujin arrangement CDs of Tokimeki Memorial, and likely plenty of doujinshi as well.


I'll be sure to keep note of different perspectives of Japan in those two periods. Before and after 2008... I'd also like to ask, fearing the longevity of this thread, for a method of contacting you for more information. I'd certainly like to discuss this more in depth over a less transient medium.